Page 19 of Zero Pucks

There was a tiny update on his bio that stated he lived on the East Coast and was currently coaching peewee hockey after a short stint with the USA Paralympic team. The man was far better than I ever deserved, and that could not be argued.

I was nothing more than some nobody, the nerd of accounting with no life and no accomplishments to speak of. Oh, and the one time Ihadlet loose, I’d broken every ounce of my moral code and screwed around on my ex before breaking up with him.

I slammed the laptop shut and didn’t look again. All I could really hope for was that he forgave me when I explained what happened. He might have been drunk too, but the state I’d been in at the bar, it was most definitelymewho had initiated the whole dipshit, married thing.

God, I could not be trusted with myself.

Luckily, my flights were all calm, but unluckily, that meant weird, unsettling stress nightmares midflight about faceless husbands and evil exes chasing me through the streets. More than once, I’d woken up gasping, grabbing at my seat neighbor, who looked entirely disturbed.

The waves of humiliation were just never-ending.

Soon enough though, my last flight landed, and suddenly, I was in Boston. I had no real plans to stick around, but my stomach made me wish I’d booked a room there to recover for the night. I wasn’t a well-traveled man. It had been damn near exotic to visit Vegas and see the bright lights, marvel at the sea of tourists, and hear a chorus of languages I wasn’t fluent in.

I’d gotten lost several times on purpose, and for a while, I hadn’t wanted to be found. Now, here I was, putting an entire country between me and Bryce. Running away like a coward, which was probably what he was telling everyone I was doing.

In some respects, I supposed he was right. It was easier for me to find the stranger I’d made a huge mistake with than deal with whatever Bryce wanted to throw at me.

I had no regrets, but the pain of wishing I was a better man—a stronger man—nipped at my heels with every step I took.

The car rental went smoothly, and before I was really aware of the reality of the situation, I was back on a crowded freeway heading east. I was unprepared for the level of traffic, though I’d commuted to LA for the first half of my adult years, so I wasn’t quite sure why I was so taken aback.

Maybe it was the stop and go. The stillness was the hardest for me to deal with. It gave time for thinking, and thinking was the last thing I wanted to do with my free time. I endured it for twenty minutes before using the next long gridlock pause to figure out how to hook up my Bluetooth to the speaker.

Now, I could drown myself out with the calming, dulcet tones of the English narrator telling me, for the dozenth time, the beauty and tragedy of Patroclus and Achilles’ love story.

By the time the two ancient characters were discovering the forbidden taste of each other’s lips in a cave, I was passing the town line for Turenne. It was marked by an old-school-looking wooden sign with a big, bushy tree carved into the front.

It was…quaint. Kind of old-style European in a way, with tree-lined roads that were nothing like home. Even in the mountains of California, it wasn’t like this. Those were tall, thready pines that cast mottled shade.

This was something else. It was thick. Lush. I could smell water on the ground even without my windows open. This was late spring, but I could only imagine what it would be like when autumn came. Not that I’d be here. There would be no reason for me to stick around for that long.

At some point, Bryce would be dealt with, and my life would go back to the way it was. I’d head into the office without worrying about some crisis disrupting my day and threatening to get me fired. I’d relearn to cook for one, though that one wouldn’t be too hard because he’d stopped eating my cooking two years ago. But I’d figure out how to shop for one and how to stop timing my entire day around my ex.

And if I was very, very lucky, I’d stop looking over my shoulder out of fear that he was standing behind me.

Oh good, my stress nausea was back. I was desperate to be out of the car and in some kind of bed by the time the GPS told me I was reaching the little rental. I hadn’t gotten the check-in email yet, but that was fine. I needed to stop by the little grocery market and grab food so I wouldn’t have to leave the house in the next few hours.

Or maybe days, depending on my level of cowardice.

The parking lot was mostly empty, which was a relief, and the feeling of stretching my legs was amazing. It was better than sex. Well, better than the sex I’d been having. Once Bryce gave up trying to impress me, which hadn’t lasted very long, he’d either become a two-pump-and-dump or a dead fish, depending on whether he felt like topping or bottoming.

The lackluster events had all but killed my libido, and a good bar of chocolate was far more satisfying these days.

Which reminded me Idefinitelywanted chocolate. At some point, the reality of this was going to slam into me without hitting the brakes, and yeah. I was going to need all the comfort I could find.

It felt weird to be on solid ground, so far away from home. There was a warmth in the air I wasn’t expecting to feel, though the only thing I knew about this part of the country was that it snowed.

A lot.

Something I hadn’t seen since I was a kid.

And there was a floral scent on the breeze, and the air was strangely soft and kind. It was also quiet in ways I was unprepared for. I could hear insects and birds off in the distance, but the powerful sounds of commuter traffic were utterly absent.

It made me shiver a little as I grabbed one of the tiny carts and headed through the sliding doors. Inside was familiar, a boutique market that started with rows and rows of flower bouquets and wine in gift boxes. It opened up to the produce section, where everything was on display in wooden crates—artfully arranged to look like a country market.

It all seemed so…fresh.

My eyes were immediately drawn to the citrus, so I loaded up on pink oranges, then grabbed apples and two containers of strawberries, which would definitely end up molding before I got through them all.

---